June 2012 – Betsy Schow

How Do You Get Published?

This is one of super obnoxious chicken and the egg type questions. In an effort to get a book published, authors often run into the wall of platform and previous works.
Agents and publishers want to know that you have an audience. That people like your work. That you actually already know how to write. You know, the stuff you put in that all important Bio part of the query letter.

In other words to get published, you have to already be published.

There’s always the slush pile. You can get picked out of inbox sitting on an editor or agents desk. It happened to me. This is one of those lightning striking kind of things though. Right place, right time, bottle ready to catch that lightning.

But there is another way grasshoppers. Build up your credentials. Enter Contests, start a super popular blog (I clearly do not have the machanics down on this one yet), submit short stories and essays to magazines, find places on the web looking for content writers.

Today I’m going to plug the first option: Contests. One in particular.
Mormon Mommy Writers blog is having a contest. We are looking for personal essays, short stories, poems, haiku, limmericks (just kidding), but you get the idea. The subject pertains to the title of our blog. Mormons, Mommies, and Writers. Write about one or all. You don’t even have to be a Mormon or a Mommy to enter. Just a writer. Winners and honorable mentions will be published in an anthology.
Mormon Mommy Writers

So enter hopeful writers. What do you have to lose. Nothing. What do you have to gain. A publication credit. Something to put on that bio section.

Good luck! For more contest info use the above link. Submissions must be received by July 31. And yes, I am one of the judges.

Some things are not a race

I was talking to an “anonymous” friend yesterday. She read my Fleshy Confessions post from a couple days ago. She informed me about this great product that would shed all 12 of those pounds in one week. All I had to do was starve myself and subsist only on a special “drink” (nameless on purpose).

I told her, um, no.
Why? she asked. It’s only a week. Anyone can do something for just a week.

I told her the same thing I’m gonna tell you, some things are not a race. I don’t have a big fluffy white dress I need to walk down the aisle in a week. Nor am I entering a swimsuit competition anytime soon. I have learned my lesson about losing weight way too fast. It plays hell with your skin, (think a deflated balloon in several prime locations), absolutely screws up your hormone and body chemistry, and is mostly water and waste weight anyway. And it comes back.

I’m in no hurry. I can afford to be smart and tweak my life to lose a pound a week instead of turning it upside to lose it all.

I’m going to impart a little nugget of wisdom, so pay attention: The only way to long-lasting weight loss success, is finding a lifestyle that you can keep. Everyday. Without wanting to shoot yourself.

Full Body: Fleshy Confessions

If you’ve been reading for awhile, you know I am all about taking responsibility for my actions and choices. So it’s time I confess a couple of actions and their consequence.

Choice #1 – in an attempt to focus only on getting through the marathon, I ditched the scale so I wouldn’t focus on the numbers, just on how my body felt.

Choice #2 – Believing my friend when he said, you run marathons, you can eat whatever the heck you want.

Result: 12 lbs. extra on the scale. Lame.

Now I’m not fat by any means, just a little on the fleshy side. The high endurance training has just eaten through any muscled definition I had in December in my peak shape. My pants are snug, but they still fit. But when I look in the mirror, I miss seeing the contours of my waist, the slight curve in toned arms, to say nothing of a non saggy bum.

So no excuses. I know exactly what to do. Drag myself to the gym for weight training 3x a week. Zumba 2x and running 1x. Sunday I’ll pass out. I’m starting on a 1500 calorie budget, but I will adjust as necessary if that is too little.

I’m not in a hurry. I don’t need it off tomorrow. Or even next month. If I keep exercising and keep to the budget, the fat will go down and the muscles will go up.

I thought about taking a NOW picture for reference, but aside from my arms, it’s really hard to tell with clothes on. And as much as I love you guys, I am not stripping to sports bra and panties for y’all.

So join me, or just tune in. Either way, it will be an adventure. I’ll update every Wednesday

Today’s Weight – 154

Snack Smart: Cake workout

For dinner, my family went to Beto’s. My favorite thing on the planet is flan. Mexican custard. Depending on the size, it is 200-350 calories. The one I opted for was at the high end of the scale.

Before eating it, I made a conscious choice. I had been eating high protein all day, plus lots of fruit and veggies. So treat wise, I could fit it in. But if I had it, then I would need to make room in my budget. My caloric budget. Which was already spent for the day. So my only choice is to wave goodbye to my favorite treat. Or eat it and earn the calories. Just like I have to pay the restaurant, I need to pay my body in exercise.

For the record, every bite was savored. And now I am off to run 3 1/2 miles to pay for my treat. Totally worth it.

For the record

Fitness Tip… Weight for it

Pride can really bite you in the butt…
…and the hamstrings…
…and the biceps…
…and the chest…

Last week I went back to weight training after 2 months away while I was finishing the marathon training. So I foolishly tried to pick up exactly where I had left off.

And I paid for it everytime I moved for the rest of the week.

I didn’t want to use a lower weight because, in my head, it would mean I was weaker. Well I would much rather the slight sting to my pride than the big pain in my …

So when choosing your weights for lifting, choose wisely. Don’t pick the the same ones as your neighbor just to keep up. Don’t pick the weights based on what you used to be able to handle.

Choose your weights based solely on your fitness level THAT day. Than increase or decrease depending how that made you feel.

Your muscles will thank you.

De-sensitivity Training for the Zombie Apocalypse

Be forewarned. I am in a ranty mood today. Ranted on my other blog too. Ranting is good for the soul :p

Unless you’ve already hidden yourself in a bomb shelter, you probably are aware of the so called Zombie Apocalypse. The rash of odd cannibal stories in the news. The homeless guy eating the face off another man in Florida. The Canadian Pornstar Psycho that killed his lover, taped it, did awful things to him post mortem, then ate him and mailed pieces all over Canada and uploaded the video of the whole thing on the internet.

It’s the last instance that disturbs me to the core. Not mainly the acts described above. While horrifying and unconscionable, it’s still just one psycho. No, what keeps me up at night is what happened after.

A high school teacher in Canada thought it would be a good idea to screen this psycho’s little pornagraphic snuff film for his students. The fact that young minds were subjected to the atrocities that this man committed is horrible. Even worse, were the students reactions themselves.

After watching the killer perform sex acts on the corpse, eat him, then dismember him, one student said, “It was bad… yeah. But I’ve seen worse in the movies.”

AHHH! What the heck? What are we saying when the movies are showing things equal to these real life horrors. And worse, that these kids cannot emotional tell the difference between watching a scripted show with red cornsyrup and CGI, and a real psychopath killing a real person who had a real soul with a real family.

So people, don’t spend your time worrying about the Zombie Apocalypse. If this de-sensitivity to violence continues, we will have much bigger problems to worry about.

The Incredible Shrinking Catwoman

I warn you ahead of time. This is a rant.

I read an ABC News story yesterday about radical star diets for the roles they play. The one featured was about Anne Hathaway, the new Catwoman. I have always loved Anne Hathaway in the past because she looked more like a real girl as opposed to a stick puppet. However, to prepare for her roles as Catwoman and an ill girl in Les Miserables, she has at one point dropped her caloric intake to 500 calories per day, and puts 5 hours a day in at the gym.
“The Catwoman suit. It was a psychological terrorist,” she said. “… the suit, thoughts of my suit, changing my life so I would fit into that suit … it dominated my year. I went into the gym for 10 months and didn’t come out.” -Anne Hathaway Allure magazine

Why?!! Why are we doing this to ourselves as a society? Think of some of the past greats. Liz Taylor… Marilyn Monroe. They were women, not barbies. Let’s look at Julie Newmar who played Catwoman in the 1966 movie.

Girl had some curves.

Next up we have Eartha Kitt.

A little slighter than the last

Onto Michelle Pfiffer

No real curves to speak of. Very slender waist.

Lets go to Anne Hathaway in a recent photo shoot to promote the movie, Dark Knight Rises

She’s got some cleavage, I’ll give her that. You can’t have a heroine these days without a nice rack. But where did the rest of her go?

Here’s one of her the year before

Gorgeous. Normal.

The promo picture of her is beautiful. Don’t get me wrong. But the effort to maintain that body is completely insane and unsustainable. Yet she will be frozen in place forever as that size in that movie. The public will not think about the long days of starving with radishes and hummus and working in the gym. We will just say, “That is beauty.”

It’s not, it’s a costume.

And who wants to put on a costume everyday for the rest of their life?

Not me. I would much rather have a little extra fluff around the edges and eat healthy, than live in the gym obssessively- ignoring every other aspect of life.

I for one wish there were a few less “costumes” in Hollywood, and a few more real people.

Full Body: Losing the Pooch

There are so many names for that area between the groin and the belly button. Pooch, Bunt, Kangaroo Pouch, etc. For women who have previously born a child, it can be puffy and one of the toughest areas to target.

But could the way you’re walking be preventing those lower abdominal muscles from strengthening — creating a nice vacation home for fat? Two common forms of posture for standing and walking, is hips tucked in or booty hanging out. That would be the first picture and the fourth picture.

When you walk and stand in the number one position, hips tucked in, your lower abdominal muscles engage and tone in a smaller straight alignment to the sacrum of the spine. Over time, these muscles will tone and squeeze out the fat between the layers of muscles.

Now go to the booty out picture in number 4. By sticking your butt out, you are not tightening you core muscles, you are actually puffing them out. The muscles can build and form in almost a convex curve as opposed to a straight tight fiber bundle. The fat then adheres and follows the shape — allowing for a more bulbous front then most of us would like.

So once again, the easiest way to a better shape over time… is posture. Tuck those hips in and soon you will continue to do so without effort. It’s not an overnight correction. It will take months. But walking with your butt hanging out is like undoing all those crunches and sit ups you do every day.

Muscle Bonus: If you want to tone that lower abdomen faster, here’s an exercise for you… heels to the heavens.

After this position, comes the crunch. Leaving the middle spine on the floor, bring the shoulders and chest up slightly and get your talbone up off the floor in short bursts. A modification for this would be leaving the shoulders back and arms on the ground and just raising the legs and the tailbone. Hence raising your heels to the heavens.

Fitness Tip + Snack Smart: Muscle Fuel

Kathy working out

I know, I forgot to blog yesterday. So this is both a fitness tip and a snack smart.

Our bodies are machines. Machines need fuel. What kind of fuel depends on the task you are asking it to perform.

High endurance athletes need lots of carbs for energy and glucose stores.
PMSing women need lots of chocolate to survive the week.
Body builders need lots of protein to build muscle.

Where are you in the fuel spectrum? I am going from marathon training — high endurance– to muscle toning. Now I will in no way shape of form be a bodybuilder, but I need protein just the same. Not like, 10 shakes a day protein, but enough to build up the muscles I am breaking down. I generally shoot for 90 grams a day.

Now that sounds like a lot. And you are probably picturing me walking around with a steak in my mouth. But protein doesn’t have to just come from red meat. Here are some of my favorite alternate routes for protein intake:

Protein shake– whey in particular. Nasty, but effective and fast
Protein bar– not my favorite. Uber nasty and can often have high sugar content you need to watch. And saturated fats.
Cottage cheese– my stand by. 14 g per half cup. One cup of this in the morning with some berries and I am on my way.
Legumes– fancy word for beans. Chili is yummy.
Nuts– filled with protein, these tasty treats can also include healthy fats in your diet. This doesn’t mean to eat the whole can.

Think of your car for a minute. Would you pour sugar into your gas tank? No. I’m not saying to go sugar free, just emphasizing that the wrong fuel for your body and its tasks can make you sputter and die on the side of the road.

Tut, Tut, looks like rain

One of the writer’s in my critique group posed a question the other day. She was having trouble with character dialogue.All of her characters sound the same. She said, If it’s going to rain, wouldn’t the character just say that. “It’s going to rain. Or it’s raining”. No matter who they were.

The answer of course is…bzzzz… wrong. If every character had the same way of phrasing something, there would be no character at all. Here are a few examples.

“Tut, Tut, looks like rain”- Winnie-the -Pooh

“The nicest thing about rain is that it always stops. Eventually.” – Eeyore

“There’s a storm blowin’ up – a whopper, to speak in the vernacular of the peasantry” Professor Marvel, Wizard of OZ

“My breasts can always tell when its going to rain” Karen on Mean Girls

You get my drift. Characters are interesting and memorable because they have interesting and memorable things to say. A person is 3 dimensional, with a past and personality that colors their word choice.

Here’s an exercise. Your character needs to say they’re hungry.

Pooh would say “I’ve got a rumbly in my tumbly.”

How would a colonist from space say it?

A Farmer?

An 11 yr old?

Have fun and be creative!!